For many years, businesses and schools have used refuse compactors to handle the large volume of waste produced by people eating in company cafeterias and school lunchrooms. To limit the need for additional employees to pick up waste at each table, most compactors were designed as open-door systems where each person deposits waste directly into the compactor.
Because of the large volume of waste produced on a daily basis, compactors require significant compacting force to reduce the volume of refuse. Compactors must also be easy to clean because much of t-eh waste placed in compactors is food. Compactors ar usually cleaned after each use to prevent odor and rodent problems.
In refuse compactors used mainly by adults or children supervised by adults, existing safety features may be adequate. But in environments where conventional refuse compactors are used with preschoolaged children or inadequately supervised children, the safety features provided with most conventional compactors are inadequate.
There is therefore a need for a refuse compactor that can be used in environments where young children are present. Such a compactor needs not only to be safe for children to use, but easy to clean. Some prior art compactors use guards and baffles to ensure their users' safety, but the guards are difficult and time-consuming to remove, and these compactors require cleaning several times a day.